Caption: Kidney transplant surgery. Close-up of a surgeon implanting a healthy kidney (centre, pink) into a patient during a transplant operation. This kidney was removed from the patient's wife 2 hours before this operation. Kidneys are transplanted to replace a failing or failed kidney. Kidney transplants have a high success rate, although recipients do need to take immunosuppressant drugs for the rest of their life to prevent rejection. The donor kidney may come from a living or recently deceased donor and can be kept viable outside of the body for several days.